FASHION GOES PRUSSIAN
Milan, Paris, New York,
London...Berlin? Whisper it, but the
German capital's fashion week is
becoming an increasingly important date
on the international style calendar.
Caroline Davies reports
It's late January, an icy wind is blasting over from the steppes,
and amid the concrete Modernism of the German capital a
festival of creativity is taking place. Berlin has, over the past
few years, gained a reputation as a burgeoning centre of art and
design, and each year Berlin's Fashion Week takes a step closer
to the Big Four of Milan, Paris, New York and London as a
key date on the fashion calendar.
True, Berlin has a long way to go before it competes with London, let alone the others, on a fashion editor's schedule: but Germany, Europe's economic hub, has long been a clothing trade centre, and a visit to Mercedes-Benz Berlin Fashion Week (to give it its full title) reveals a unique blend of creativity and industry.
"After unification, Berlin reinvented itself," says Philippe Wolf, Senior Vice President of Communication at Hugo Boss, one of the biggest brands to show at the week. "We had always thought about doing a fashion week, but it was very good that someone from outside came in and said, 'we need to establish this'".
That someone was German carmaker Mercedes-Benz, which had already made a great success of its topline sponsorship of New York fashion week. Mercedes-Benz's link to fashion has spread to a presence in over 30 countries, including involvement with what Anders Sundt Jensen, its Head of Brand Communications, terms "the big five: Paris, Milan, London, New York and Berlin". By far the youngest, Berlin, which started in earnest in 2006, shows well-known brands such Hugo Boss, Iris van Herpen and Strenesse alongside younger brands, such as Patrick Mohr and Kaviar Gauche and attracts new independent designers each season.
German fashion has not found it easy to discover its international niche. Although admired for their innovation, designers lacked the appropriate commercial platform to fit their work. Trade fairs, such as the niche streetwear fairs "Bread and Butter" and "Premium", began to spring up across the country in the early 2000s. Slowly migrating to Berlin, the fairs caught the interest of the international fashion market. Then Mercedes-Benz stepped in and BFW went global.
Berlin is not merely having a fashion moment; fashion design is a well-established industry with more than 800 international designers and local labels working within the city and nine different fashion schools training the next generation. In a city used to upheaval, a multitude of new beginnings has attracted young idealists, seeking fresh ideas and breeding creativity. Caught between the east and west, it has absorbed talent from both and across generations.
"One of the wonderful things about Berlin is that young people live right in the centre with the other generations," Woolf says. "It gives you a great mix of people. There is huge creative potential which makes it different from the other fashion weeks."
The new designs emerging from Germany do not fit the
old guard, but this is part of their appeal; distinct and diverse,
this new generation of designers are strutting their own path. 
